Of Death and Life, Darkness and Light
by TheWaywardWhim
Summary: Uchiha Sasuke never liked the light. He never let himself feel the warmth that light and life provide. He regards that as weakness. You can say he's just cold and dead. But maybe one unexpected person in an unexpected encounter can change that. Please R


Hate…revenge…mindlessness…_**dark**_…

How could he have room for happiness in his life?

Compassion…thoughtfulness…strong mind and will…_**light**_…

**Light** had penetrated the darkness. That was how he was reborn. That was how he learned what life really is.

* * *

Uchiha Sasuke never cried. The last time he shed tears was when he learned the truth about his older brother, Uchiha Itachi. The truth confused him…and so he was vulnerable and easy to manipulate. Uchiha Madara knew this, took advantage of it, and slowly and subtly pushed him to choose to go deeper down into the darkness. Having lived in a life directed on revenge, Sasuke fell into the power of Madara, into the abyss of darkness. He chose to destroy Konoha to avenge his brother.

He was irrational, didn't think right. He never let his emotions (which he had killed a long time ago, thinking they were a sign of weakness) affect his decisions. Once bent on killing and destroying, that was all in his mind. Some said he grew up too fast. Too fast to go through different emotions and discover who he really was. That was why he was merely an empty shell who only knew hate.

That was why he was weak.

* * *

Hyuuga Hinata had always cried. Through those tears, she learned to be strong. She grew up crying often, but after letting the tears escape, she knew she would remain weak unless she changed something about herself. As the Hyuuga heiress, expectations of her were never low. But even though she worked hard, she disappointed the elders and her father on a regular basis. That was why she would cry. And that was how she discovered that no matter who told her what to do or who to be, the only person who could define her was herself.

In her world, it was never dark. Often cloudy, but never dark. Light always managed to shine through the clouds.

The light was her inner strength.

* * *

The first step of his plan to destroy Konoha was to gather information on the village. To gather strength for his night mission, Sasuke slept during the day. Light filled his closed eyelids even in his sleep. He had a dreamless sleep, no nightmares, no pleasant dreams. He awoke only when the sun had set. The moon was shining brightly. He scowled. It was not a good time for a reconnaissance mission. He had lost track of time while he was busy with his dealings with Akatsuki and figuring out his own plans. How could he have forgotten that tonight was a full moon?

But being the stubborn man he was, Sasuke still planned to go through with the mission even though he told his team that the mission was off for tonight. He was going to be on his own. It was easier to not get noticed that way anyway.

* * *

She could not sleep. She had a feeling something bad was going to happen. But bad feeling or not, she knew she would not be able to go to sleep easily. So she picked up the shamisen that she used to play a lot with her mother when she was little. It has been a while since she last touched the instrument.

Hinata walked quietly out of the compound and into the training grounds. She carefully sat on the grass (so as not to ruin the light yukata she was wearing) and leaned on the bark of a large tree near a small river. She closed her eyes and plucked the strings with the bachi, playing a melody that reminded her of the soft current of the river in front of her.

* * *

Sasuke breathed deeply and another scowl made its way across his face. Konoha…It stunk of bad memories and happy faces that he was oh-so-tempted to destroy along with the village itself. Sighing, he jumped from tree to tree to begin his search for information to make his plans of infiltrating Konoha and killing the Hokage and the Elders easier.

At the sound of an instrument playing, he abruptly stopped to make sure he was cloaking his chakra well to avoid being detected by anyone. The last thing he needed was someone discovering him within the walls of Konoha, getting captured, and guaranteeing the failure of his plans.

As he was getting ready to start moving again, he heard a few familiar notes being played on the instrument. The melody, he soon realized, was the melody his mother used to hum to him whenever he had a bad dream.

_Ironic,_ he thought,_ that I'm hearing this right now while I'm in the middle of a bad dream. Konoha is just a bad dream that I just can't wait to leave and destroy. It will be a dream that will no longer exist after I get my revenge._

And strangely, he began to hum the melody.

* * *

Hinata's ears perked up at the sound of someone's deep voice accompanying her shamisen's music. Sensing an unknown presence, her ninja instinct told her to get her kunai and fling them towards the sound of the voice. She quickly advanced to the direction where the voice came from as she heard the rip of clothes and the _thunk_ of her kunai that have embedded in a tree. Activating her Byakugan, she saw Uchiha Sasuke struggling to free himself from the kunai.

Before she could even shout to warn others that the S-class missing nin Uchiha Sasuke was in the village, she found herself lying on her stomach on the ground, hands held firmly behind her back, chokuto pressed to the back of her neck. She knew he was much stronger than she was, and that any effort to struggle in an attempt to create an opening for her escape was futile. Death was inevitable. To calm herself down (and to possibly buy time), she started to hum the melody she was playing on her shamisen earlier.

"Stop making noise," Sasuke snapped as he pressed his chokuto deeper and noticed her pupil-less eyes, "Hyuuga."

Hinata swallowed hard. Running out of options, she decided to risk talking her way out. "Y-you seem to kn-know 'The River Flows Softly,'" she started, "y-you were humming it."

"Hn."

"M-my mother and I u-used to p-play it together on the sh-shamisen."

"Shut up or I really will kill you."

"B-but she d-died a-and I m-miss her. S-sometimes, I felt that sh-she was the only p-person who t-truly loved me and c-cared for me," Hinata continued anyway. "D-do you miss h-her too, U-Uchiha-san? Y-your mother?"

At this, Sasuke made a light cut on her nape. Flashbacks started to come to him. He remembered the day he saw his mother drenched in blood as Itachi put his sword back in its scabbard. All the painful memories came into his mind and he did not know why. Perhaps her resemblance to his mother and the stream of blood flowing down her neck triggered them.

Seeing an opening (as he was momentarily distracted), Hinata flipped around and kneed him on the gut. This sent him flying but his response to the attack was quick. He grabbed the sleeve of her yukata. Hinata held the V-neck of her yukata closed as she crashed on the ground with him. She turned to face him and even before he could make a move, Hinata sealed the tenketsu on his shoulders which made his arms useless. She proceeded to seal the tenketsu on his legs. Sealing many of his tenketsu points and rendering Sasuke unable to move, Hinata avoided his eyes – she was sure he would be using his Sharingan to cast a genjutsu on her.

With Sasuke immobile, she drew another kunai and poised herself ready to kill. Sasuke tried to force chakra to his tenketsu points in an effort to unseal them, but to no avail.

_I'm going to die,_ he thought_. _He looked at his attacker and noticed her graceful movements as she advanced towards him. The gracefulness, the long, dark, straight hair, the pale lavender eyes, the fair skin…she was beautiful…and deadly. Strong.

**And crying.**

_Itachi was too, before he left Konoha after the massacre._

_Why?_

"Why are you crying?"

"I c-can't…can't k-kill you," she said between wiping her tears.

"Wh-"

Her arms wound around his neck and she hugged him tightly.

"I-I'm sorry. I-I shouldn't have s-said anything a-about your family. I-I saw the p-pain on your face w-when I a-asked you about your m-mother. I-I know it's hard to l-lose people who are d-dear to you a-and often, th-things change w-when they're gone. Y-you are e-expected to d-deal with it and m-move on, t-to grow up.

_"T-to not cry so much._

_"T-to be tough, to keep strong._

_"E-even if you don't want to just yet._

_"E-even if you're not ready to face things yet –"_

"What's your point, Hyuuga?"

"I c-can't kill you. Y-you are already almost dead… I've seen you die s-slowly, die f-from the life in the l-light…die into d-darkness…And no one could s-save you. Because you wouldn't let anyone show you life – "

"Stop with the bull –"

"But tonight, I saw that you still have life in you. You can still feel pain…pain rooted in love…"

"Shit, Hyuuga! Don't you know when to keep your mouth shut?"

"You are weak and blind, Uchiha-san! Open your eyes! There is nothing to be found in the darkness! Nothing! You cannot see what's ahead of you, what's in front of you, what's around you! You are running around blindly, your determination is the only thing that keeps you going. But even then, you still cannot see, and you will never be able to see unless you –"

"Unless I what? Go back to Konoha and pretend like nothing ever happened? Go about in a state of bliss like nothing can ever affect me? Remain oblivious to things that deserve to be justified? Damn it, Hyuuga! Konoha is a breeding place for injustice, hate, and conflict! Someone very important died in the name of injustice and the rest of the village paid no attention. Someone died carrying a bad name for the village and no one, no one in this goddamn village cares! All of them deserve to die. Justice has to be served! And I will personally dirty my hands just to see that he is avenged!"

Hinata looked at him in the eye. She reached towards his face and wiped some of his tears. "Do you know what this is?" She showed him her finger wet with his tears. He looked away.

"This is emotion. This is life. This has been locked away inside you, and now it's out. You can start living again, Uchiha-san. Maybe not in Konoha, maybe not like before all of this ever happened, but Uchiha-san, you can create a life of your own. Leave the past in the darkness. Step out into the light and feel the warmth of life." She started to unblock the sealed tenketsu.

"Hyuuga –"

"Hinata. Call me Hinata."

"Hn. I won't promise you anything. And I don't owe you anything."

"I know. But I trust you."

With that, Uchiha Sasuke leaped away.

_Hyuuga Hinata, huh?_

* * *

**A/N:** Here are a few word meanings:

Shamisen – a traditional Japanese three-stringed instrument that resembles a guitar

Bachi – is used to play the shamisen (kind of like a guitar pick)

Hinata Hyuuga – in a sunny place / towards the sun

Yeah… I haven't written a fic in two years. I drew my inspiration from the song 'Radio' by He Is We but as I wrote the fic, my ideas went farther and farther away from my initial idea. Oh well. I still like how it turned out.


End file.
